Moving On Up

Don’t look now, but the Rampage are now in fifth place in the AHL West Division, and trail the fourth place Texas Stars by 10 points for the final playoff spot with a game in hand.

Annndd, guess with whom the Rampage have important dates with over the next two weeks?

Yep, the Aeros, and Rivermen, along with two games with the Stars, a team they proved they can beat Sunday.

The teams that are BELOW them in the standings, Houston, a team that can’t get out of its own way lately and has had trouble finding the net, and Peoria, which has gotten better — they even beat Chicago this past weekend — but still lags behind San Antonio right now will play five times in the next nine games

This time next week, Rampage fans should have a better indication on just how far this team can go.

That 11-game losing streak in November really put them behind the eight-ball, but Ray Edwards and Mike Pelino have done a great job getting them back in the playoff hunt.

The only iffy thing is either the Stars or Milwaukee Admirals must have a monumental collapse in order for the Rampage to take their place.

Sunday’s game in Cedar Park proved one thing — you need quality goaltending to succeed in hockey, and the Rampage got it from Justin Pogge and the Stars did not get it from Sean Ford and Matt Climie.

Ford was gone just three minutes into the game after two brutal goals were allowed by him. If the goals were a car, they would have been classified as Chevy’s.

Not good.

Sasha Pokoluk’s goal was a rocket of a shot, but a huge, bulging rebound left by Ford resulted in the powerful shot, Ford also wasn’t set when the shot came in.

Shaun Heshka’s goal was enough to have the local Stars fans consider which vegetable of choice they would fling Ford’s way. But they knew if they did throw leafy substances his way, they would simply go in the net.

Climie was an improvement, but Kyle Turris’ goal, his sixth in seven games, was a cheapy from goaltender standards, nicking Climie on the shoulder or facemask and into the net.

Joel Perrault’s goal was pretty cool, as he coasted into the zone under the radar until Climie went behind the net to fetch the puck. Unfortuanately for him, Kevin Porter beat him to the punch, and by this time, Perrault had worked himself into the crease area for an easy tap-in to a wide open net.

Perrault, by the way, began the sequence of events in the DEFENSIVE ZONE that led to the goal that provided padding for the Herd. Perrault poke checked the puck off the stick of a Star camped all alone to Pogge’s right when Pogge was on his left. Not a good position (can you say OPEN NET!).

Perrault dived at the puck, got up, retrieved it, sent it up ice to Kevin Porter and then joined the former Michigan great on a “broken” two-on-two as Joel put it.

Porter went right, ended up baiting Climie who came out of his crease to miss the puck behind his net. Perrault meandered into the left corner, thinking Clmie might accidentally pass there, but when he saw Porter about to make a play, he went to the net to bury the very important fourth goal and a 4-2 lead.

Pogge by the way had a tussle with one of the Stars, and ended up slamming the door on the enrushing Stars. S.A. was up 3-0 when Texas scored twice quickly to shave the lead to one. The building was on fire, fans were really into it and Pogge could have gone either way — playing like a man possessed, which he did, or a guy who just got roughed up.

Pogge chose to exact his revenge on the scoreboard, slamming the door on any and all Stars shots until there were 37 seconds left.

With all the warts of Sunday’s performance, Rampage coach Ray Edwards loves that team. “Texas is a hard team, boy,” said Edwards. “They work. I like the way they work.

Teams that work like that, you know they are buying in, they have a plan. That’s what we’re trying to get in here, that work every night, every shift. And we got it tonight.”

I asked Ray what he was happy about right now and he said, “I’m happy that we won three of four games. We’ve been through a real tough schedule right now, playing eight in 12 nights and the last four have been good (with the exception of Saturday’s loss to Manitoba perhaps). We have to build off that. I’m happy that the road trip the way it did, as far as getting on the winning side of it. Now we have to get a little rest here and deal with next week.”

And this coming week, although no walk in the park, the woe-be-gon Aeros, as well as the Ice Hogs, whom the Rampage match up well against, come to town with the Rivermen laying in wait the following week.

The Aeros are really struggling offensively, scoring only 14 goals in their last 10 games, which has translated into a 3-7 record. One of those wins was a 1-0 nail biter over the Rivermen. The streak began with an embaressing 7-2 home loss to the lowly Grand Rapids Griffins, the team with the worst record in the Western Confernce. And Chicago scored six goals in the first period in a game after the Aeros were shut out in two straight contests.

Although the Rampage were beaten by Rockford in Illinois last week, they were hardly blowouts, so we should have a pretty good idea of just how close this team can get to a playoff and dig out of their November hole.